Humor
Santa and Mrs. Claus in Quarantine after Elves Test Positive for Coronavirus
Information on the elves who tested positive and guidelines for parents this year regarding possible Christmas Eve gift-leaving
There is a crisis this year at the North Pole as over a dozen of Santa’s elves have tested positive for COVID-19. Per CDC guidelines this means that Santa and Mrs. Claus, who routinely mingle with their elves, along with the rest of the more than 10,000 elves employed to make toys for children around the world will be in quarantine for two weeks.
“We are absolutely devastated,” Mrs. Claus said. “We’re required to remain here at the north pole without leaving for 14 days. That will take us well past Christmas Eve and the time my husband needs to deliver the gifts to all the good girls and boys.”
“My heart is broken,” said Santa. “Never have I missed a Christmas Eve in all my years. We hope that perhaps there is a solution to this problem, but would never want to risk putting millions of children and their families at risk.”
Although the names of the elves who contracted the virus have not been released to protect their privacy and safety, I was able to talk by phone to two of them, who I’ll simply refer to as Elf A and Elf B.
“I guess you have seen that this story has already gotten around the world. There have been demonstrations, protests, publicly made threats. You aren’t the most popular folks right now. What happened?”
“We were careless. That’s the long and the short of it. We were just plain careless,” said Elf A. “We’ve been so careful in the workshop and our quarters. We wear masks all the time except when we eat or sleep.
An addition was put onto the workshop this year to give us more space so that we can remain at least 6 feet apart at all times. We’ve all been tested monthly since April and not one of us has tested positive.
But we all have days off and when we do, we usually go into town. We love our jobs, we do. What could be better than making toys for children for the holiday? But staring at the same four walls day in and day out can be a bit trying.
So, yeah, on our days off we all want to get out of there for a while. We’re supposed to keep our masks on and follow social distancing practices but sometimes we just want to let loose and masks and staying away from people don’t really go with that.”
“So, do you think you all picked it up at the same time?”
“We’re pretty sure where we got it,” said Elf B. “It was at a party. This time of year there are a lot of people who come to the North Pole trying to catch a glimpse of Santa or his wife, one of us elves, or the reindeer.
We’re supposed to stay on the down-low to maintain the mystery in the whole thing. I mean if just anyone can get up close to any of us or even Santa’s flying reindeer there wouldn’t be any magic left in Christmas Eve.
But still, it’s a bit heady when you are recognized and you’re treated like a celebrity.
So, when someone figured out who we were at this bar and invited us to a party, we couldn’t resist. The host said we would be the guests of honor. No one had masks on and we didn’t want to stand out.”
“Then you weren’t wearing masks, and I would imagine there was no social distancing?”
Elf A laughed. “Social distancing. It was crowded when we got there but when the host announced who we were over the sound system you could see everyone start texting. More people kept showing up until it was packed. Everyone wanted to talk to us. We must have talked to more than 1000 people that night.”
“And you didn’t think it was risky, all those people from all over the world right up close to you and no one wearing masks?”
“Well, truthfully, there was a lot of drinking going on. Everyone wanted to get us a drink. I know several of us got hammered. But we all showed up for work the next day,” Elf A said.
“You must have known the risk. You were sober the next day. Why didn’t you report it?”
“We’d have been fired on the spot! Three elves were fired last month for just being seen having a quiet drink at a bar that was practically empty. We’re not supposed to go anywhere to eat or drink because we can’t wear masks,” Elf A replied.
“But now you’ve been fired anyway plus you’ve possibly exposed Santa, Mrs. Claus, and over 1000 other elves to the virus.”
“I guess we didn’t think we’d get caught,” said Elf B.
“How did you get caught?”
“People posted photos all over social media,” said Elf B.
“And you didn’t realize that was likely to happen? Everyone has cell phones now and everyone posts photos online. My 10-year-old niece practically lives her life online.”
“I know. Pretty stupid looking back at things. We just wanted to have fun for one night,” said Elf A
“And now? With Christmas Eve up in the air? Do you still think it was a reasonable thing to do?”
“Look, I know we screwed things up. But you don’t know what kind of pressure there is this time of year. There’s a hard deadline that can’t be changed. Santa has to be in the air at a certain time and he can’t be one minute late if he’s to make it to every house before sunrise.
All-nighters aren’t unusual and by this point days off are a thing of the past. It was our last one until December 25th. We’re working fast, things go wrong, elves get hurt or sick leaving us short-handed and behind schedule.
Last year we almost didn’t make the deadline. It came down to only 15 minutes. Santa was okay, he’s pretty jolly most of the time. But Mrs. Claus, boy was she pissed,” said Elf A.
“She’s pretty protective of her husband,” added Elf B. “She doesn’t want him flying off after that kind of stress. So, this year she’s been on our backs constantly, telling us how much time there is left, as if we can’t see the enormous scoreboard with the countdown on it. It can get to you after a while.”
“But now over a dozen of you have tested positive, exposed everyone, and just may have gotten Christmas canceled.”
“Yeah, that’s bad. No doubt about it,” said Elf A.
“Real bad,” said Elf B.
CDC is consulting with health officials at the North Pole to consider possible alternatives to the standard guidelines for exposure. It’s possible if no one else tests positive and no one has any symptoms, that they’ll allow the quarantine to be shortened to ten days which would end on Christmas Eve, allowing Santa to make his rounds.
Should that be the case, CDC has provided the following information and instructions for parents around the world in order to eliminate as much risk as possible.
a) All Santa photos for the rest of the season will be canceled. Each location will determine if they will hire someone to dress up as Santa to fill in for him, so contact your location before going.
b) Santa will not be entering any homes this year so please make sure there is no fire in the fireplace as he will be dropping presents down chimneys instead of bringing them in himself. He has a special asbestos suit to avoid burns when he slides down chimneys where fires are carelessly left burning but the toys he leaves will burn if dropped into a fire.
c) As Santa hates waste — he and Mrs. Claus have made numerous PSA’s about not being wasteful — please don’t leave out any milk and cookies this year.
d) If Santa can fly on Christmas Eve, it will still be important to maintain social distancing precautions. On occasion, a child or two will manage to hear the sleigh bells and reindeer hoofs on the roof and be waiting when Santa slides down the chimney or even manage to get to the roof to see Rudolf and the rest along with Santa when he comes back up. While Santa will not be entering any homes this year it’s still important for parents to keep an eye on the Santa radar reports to determine when he will be arriving in their area. All parents need to make sure that children are in bed when he is scheduled to be there to prevent any precocious ones from possible exposure.
Be sure to visit our site regularly as we will be adding updates as soon as we get them. When there is a definite decision as to whether Santa will fly on Christmas Eve or not, you’ll hear it here first.
Natalie Frank has a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology. She specializes in Pediatrics and Behavioral Medicine. Her collection of poetry, Disguised I Breathe, In Love I Hold, can be found here on Amazon.
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